Bloodlines
by Shadow Wasserson
Summary: "Our family has the strongest line of bloodbenders in history."


**Disclaimer:** Not even sort of mine.

**A/N: **Just a shortie._  
_

Strong 'T' rating, but I don't _think_ it strayed above that. Let me know if you think it should be 'M.'

* * *

**Bloodlines**

The first time he came to her, it was during the daily watering, and Hama, thirsty and desperate, knew what was coming. She'd seen it happen to other women in the cells, had heard their cries and pleas, and knew better than to think that she could fight or beg her way out. Instead, she slumped in her shackles like a broken thing, like a pliant thing, like a body that was not a person at all. She did not look at his face.

She was only a body. A bag of flesh. Something to be used. And she was used, that night and for many nights more. And when her stomach churned and swelled against her will, she prayed to every spirit that might listen, for forgiveness, for help, for death, for things she didn't even have names for. She tried to hurt herself, throw herself against the bars, and so she was shackled.

As her condition progressed, and Hama's belly dropped low, they watched her carefully. This had not happened before. Most of the women in the prison had long stopped bleeding. Not Hama. Her bloodline was strong.

One night, Hama, plastered in sweat, watched as a wailing, bloody babe was lifted from her feet. She did not even see if it was male or female, before they took it away. She did not even see its face.

For the rest of her life she presumed it dead, killed, gone. And knowing there were worse fates, she was glad for it.

* * *

The new world of Republic City was not like the one it replaced. The secrets of bending were no longer hidden away by hermetic masters, and even if they weren't practiced, simply making the taboo explicit raised the possibility. Lightningbending was widespread, and metalbending a controlled tool. And while waterbenders were not allowed to explore their talents to the same degree, everyone knew that they could be more powerful than anyone, if they were only permitted to be. And of course, Yakone was already a criminal.

Yakone's first crime ring fell apart. It was weak, and the much stronger Blue Spirit Triad tore his fellows to pieces. Literally, in some cases. He escaped with his life, but little else. He ran.

"So now you come home, hm?" Yakone's mother looked in disgust at the tattered young man on her stoop. "I'm not a powerful woman! I cannot shelter you from the police, and I'm not sure I even should."

"Let the poor boy in!" snapped Yakone's grandmother. "Spirits know it's hard enough out there without family turning against you."

Yakone came in, and his grandmother smiled thinly at him. "I thought she'd listen to that. Always liked Water Tribe philosophies, your mother." The old woman scratched her chin. "You're a lucky kid, Yakone. I was raised in an orphanage. Never had a family to go to."

Yakone didn't consider himself lucky. He considered himself poor. His mother and grandmother lived in a shack, in a United Republic shantytown outside of Republic City proper.

"Now," continued his grandmother. "Heal my hand. My arthritis is acting up something terrible, and you know how expensive medicines are."

Yakone took some water from the washing bucket, and worked on healing his grandmother's hand. The pulse of her energy was tied up in her joints, inflamed, and she sighed contentedly as the young man soothed it.

"I'm not going to ask you what you've been up to," Yakone's grandmother continued. "But I will ask you why you came back."

Yakone replied after a moment, not meeting her gaze. "I wasn't strong enough."

"Hmph. What kind of excuse is that? If you're not strong enough, then get stronger!" Yakone's grandmother withdrew her hand. "You're a talented boy. Smart. Use your head!"

But throughout the underworld, no one could teach Yakone the secrets he craved. No one knew how to bloodbend, or were too fearful of reprisal to try learning. So, seething with furious ambition and dreaming in red, Yakone decided to go about it mechanically.

He bought blood from a butcher, and found it easy enough to bend. The live chicken-pigs proved harder, so he killed them, and bent the blood in their dead bodies until they went stiff. He experimented for months of moons before he could make a live chicken-pig even twitch against its will.

After that, he pushed the boundaries in every way he could. He bent one chicken-pig, then entire flocks of lizard crows. He bent them with swift jerks of his arms, then with the barest movements of his face and fingers. He bent them to unconsciousness, and learned that when he concentrated entirely on one individual, he could bloodbend the birds to death.

Then, one night, he bent the crows when the moon was just one day too small. At that moment, the world changed to Yakone, in some subtle way. It seemed a slicker texture, a more congealed color. Or perhaps he just carried himself differently. But no matter. He bent the crows when the moon was a sliver, and he bent them in daylight. The sun, and the earth itself, seemed to strengthen him as much as the moon did.

And when he found the Blue Spirit Triads again, they bowed until their faces scraped the dust.


End file.
